‘Argo’ Takes Top Honors Again at Directors Guild Awards

In the 65-year history of the Directors Guild Awards, there have only been six times when the winner of Best Feature Film Director has not gone on to win the Best Director Oscar. With a victory last night, Argo director Ben Affleck will now be the seventh, as he was famously left out of the running for Oscar when the nominations were announced on Jan. 10.

Returning to the stage as the winner, Affleck referred to his fellow nominees as “my betters, there’s no other way to say it.”

Affleck was famously looked over for the Best Director Oscar, which normally dooms a film’s Best Picture chances. (For example, in 1996, Ron Howard‘s Apollo 13 won the DGA, Producers Guild Award and Screen Actors Guild ensemble award, but Howard was not nominated in the Oscar directing category, and his movie lost out to Braveheart.) With all of its wins at the various guilds, Argo is picking up traction, and has gone from underdog to front-runner in the Oscar race.

Academy members will finally be able to begin voting for the Oscars on Feb. 8, nearly a month after nominations were announced. The Oscar ceremony will be held on Feb. 24.

Also at the DGA Awards, Looper director Rian Johnson won the drama series director award for an episode of “Breaking Bad”.

And director Milos Forman was given a Lifetime Achievement Award during a presentation by DGA president Taylor Hackford and the ceremony’s host, Kelsey Grammer. Due to his ailing health, Forman was not able to attend the ceremony.

An avid Flickcharter since 2009, Nigel is a self-described fanboy whose Top 20 is dominated by the likes of Indiana Jones, Frodo Baggins and Marty McFly. Nigel is the Canadian arm of the Flickchart Blog, but try not to hold that against him. You can find him on Flickchart as johnmason.